since may. volume 1

I used to live here.

We had lots of room to roam.  

And roam we did.

Our closest neighbors were horses, Jane and Patrick, remember them?

There were also some sheep too.  I don't know their names.

No one could see you outside at this house.  So you could walk around in your underpants in the great outdoors.  

That's how God intended, right? 

 Underpants and rainboots.

There was a creek behind the house. (tho truthfully that may just have been a sewage drain... creek sounds more romantic.)

I had plans for this house.

There were chickens.  

The hound dogs could run until they couldn't run anymore.

Oh, and the front porch.  

The front porch! 

There was a fireplace in the dining room, with a rocking chair and an ottoman.

A perfect place for taking tea.  If you do things like that.

And I do.

And the main walls of this house are over 200 years old.  

This house has seen things.

This house was built with love.

And lived in, in love.

There were going to be goats, and horses, more chickens (you can never have enough chickens), gardens, greenhouses, llamas, tractors, ponds.

And babies.

Martha Stewart was going to come to me for advice.

Hell, she still might.

Oh, I should mention, this house has the most glorious sunsets.  

And at night the most fantastic show of stars you've ever seen.
Outside of Loose Creek.
I do love the stars at night, out in the country.
It feels kind of like a secret between you and God...all the hidden stars you can't see when you are near the light and activity and noise of the city.
Kind of like that quiet in prayer/meditation/whatever you personally choose to call it... where you hear or feel, or know.
But you have to get away from the noise first.

How things have changed.
Now I live here.



It's not nearly so grand.
But it contains the same love.
And the same dreams.
And sunflowers, an awesome neighbor, and a whole room just for yoga.
And it seems to be just everything we need right now.
(A whole room for yoga!)
Well maybe I won't have goats, and tractors, and ponds here.
It would probably get crowded with goats and chickens and dogs.
And the driveway isn't big enough for a tractor.
And you can certainly not go outside wearing only rainboots and underpants.
(I've only almost done that a few times.)
So I'll stick with the chickens and the dogs.
Who wouldn't keep those two?
Look at 'em.


Now the chickens on the other hand.

They died.
Hawks and dogs.
May their little chicken souls rest in peace.
I will get some more chickens.
They are just such lovely creatures.

Oh, and did you know, Salami has the most wonderful sunsets.
I didn't.
In Hawaii we were in perpetual search of that elusive Hawaiian sunset
Always too late, too early, in traffic, wrong side of the island, wrong side of the mountain, storm moving in.
Never found it.
First night in Salami- orange and purple and pink sunset.
Amazing.
I wish I had a picture of that.
Just close your eyes and imagine it.
You can do it.


You probably wonder why I moved from first place to the second place.
That first house is me, in house form.
Why would I leave?
Is it because Husband and I have nomadic spirits that cannot be tamed?
Perhaps.
Actually, we moved for him to start his own practice.
Staying in our house would have been one long commute.
And I support him in whatever it is he does.
I'd follow him wherever he wants to go.
Ends of the earth.
Literally.
Here's proof. 

(This is my second to last hike.
Also known as my first hike.)

writer's block, photo shoots, oblivious runners, hiking, and a partridge in a pear tree.

I have a fantastic amount of writer's block.... maybe my writer has been blocked for four months or so....since May maybe.  

I did not even know what to write about for this, my first post since my writer was unblocked. 

 But then, inspiration struck. 

 Like a ton of pool balls.  

So in May, Husband and I went to Hawaii.  

We went to do a little modeling photo shoot on the beach. 

 We do stuff like that.  

Craziest thing happened.

Right before we went to down to the water for our photo shoot our entire plan was foiled.

Apparently these two characters had the same idea.

I'm really glad the waves weren't any bigger.  

I would have hated if she had been knocked over.  

Especially while she wasn't looking.  

In the interest of full disclosure, I wasn't really going to do a photo shoot on the beach.  

That'd be silly.

That's also not the reason we went to Hawaii.

We went to see our friends A and A get married.

That's A and A.  

And their photographer.  

And an oblivious, sweaty, running man.  

Oh, I would be remiss if I did not mention the other reason we went to Hawaii.  

To do some scary hiking.  

If you know me, you know I detest love hiking. 

 And by love I mean it makes me want to vomit and also die.  

Also, it makes me cry.  

Like a baby.  

But that is only because I feel like dying. 

 And falling of the side of a mountain to my death is a scary thought.  

So while we were on this hike I was doing okay and only sort of feeling like dying.  

Then it started to rain.  

So I started to cry. 

 Because when it rains,  it gets muddy and then it gets slippery.  

And when it gets slippery its so much scarier, you know cause you can easily slip off the mountain and fall to your death.

This is after the rain.  

Also after the crying. 

 But before the after- hike drinks that were required to soothe the nerves.  

There must always be after- hike drinks.  

Cheers to my last hike!

(And by last I mean, the last one I shall ever do...unless you are speaking of a hike in terms of a slow walk along a wide meandering path...then I may consider the hike...but only if there is after-hike wine)

Unrelated to the great photos above.

Husband thinks you need a full update on what I've done (with pictures) the last 4 months.

Yes, no?

What Makes You Happy?

Ooooh, I haven't posted in a while.  Sorry faithful followers.  All 3 of you.

So I'm reading a book called The Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin.  And I dig it.  And in it she decides that she needs to be happier.  She isn't unhappy.  But she could be happier.  And she outlines a plan that deals with different areas of her life (energy, kids, marriage, work, etc, etc, etc) with several resolutions/action points/whatever it is she calls them.  Each month has a specific focus and 4 different ongoing tasks. 

My post is not about that book.  Not really.  But I kind of started to think about what makes me happy.  And I think you/we all know how i like picture-heavy posts.  (it's less to read...although i do really like to read, so i don't know what that's all about) ANYway, this is a post of some of the things that make me happy...with the caveat that Husband has the MacBookPro (the MBP) and 99.2%....well closer to 99.98% of my pictures.  So here are some of the things that make me happy...that I have pictures of right this moment.  If you are not represented below, this does not mean you are not a source of my joy, it just means I don't have a picture available.*. 

*This is not meant to be an exhaustive list.

See the tree.  It makes me happy.  It makes me think.  Why?  Cause the top looks like one tree.  But it's three trees.  See the three trunks. I call it the Jesus tree. You know, the Trinity. Weird?  whatever.  

 My friend Janet makes me happy.  She lives far far away.  We don't see or talk to each other often.  But this is from the last time we saw each other.  We had big plans to make dinner.  We were going to make something really delicious and fancy.  So we took a bunch of cookbooks and a quilt out to that grassy spot in the picture above, so we could decide what to make. But we fell asleep instead.  And then we went out for Mexican.

Maybe next time.

 My chickens.  This is Fedders as a teenager.  Lovely,isn't he?  My chickens make me extraordinarily happy.  They are just so charming and funny.  They go on chicken adventure, take dirt baths, and lay delicious eggs.  Must be a wonderful life, the life of a chicken.

My dogs Bailey Sue and Ruger Jay.  Yes, they have middle names.  Who doens't giggle when a dog cocks its head sideways?  That's funny.  I don't care who you are.

 This is Ruger.  He loves to dig.  I think its absolutely hilarious to walk outside and find him like this.  He is buried up to his shoulders .  Funny.  The system of tunnels he has dug around the yard...not so funny. 

But then he looks like this.  Also funny.

Beautiful sunsets make me very cheery, indeed.  I like to think of them as a little shout out from The Big Man himself.

These rolls.  I wanna put that in my mouth.  De-li-cious.  That can make you forget your problems for a minute.  MMMM, bread. (Oh, and I made them.  The first bread product I've ever made...it was so good I vowed to become a breadatarian.)

pictures of my friends with my camera in stealth mode.  That makes me happy...cause you always get better pictures.  Sssshhhh, don't tell them i take pictures in stealth mode.

My goddaughter, Isabella.  Very charming.  This was taken last summer.  I think she has her drivers license now. 

My toes in the sand at the beach.  Not the sand part.  Or the water part.  The being there. 

Even better, being there with Husband.  Being anywhere with Husband.

and this.

What makes you happy??

paparazzi!

once upon a day this week i went to louisville.

and seeing as how it is farther south everything was in full, gorgeous, beautiful bloom

and so were my allergies.

that's not the point.

the point is i saw my beautiful friends.

And isn't it nice to have friends!

jenita got a mojito

and so did i.

the two of us...we love the mojito.

this is jenita drinking her mojito

is there anything more fantastic than sitting outside in the sunshine drinking mojitos?

(Well, let's pretend there isn't.)

she is accustomed to my paparazzi-like tendencies.

it reminded us of the time we went to mexico and consumed many many mojitos.

we did not consume mojitos at the mayan ruins.

it is probably frowned upon.

it was certainly hot enough tho.

juanita, look.

! a mexico picture!

christy came out to dinner as well.

she was not amused with my paparazzi- like photo taking.

she did, however, wear eyeliner for the occasion.

she said it was because she was supposed to be on the tv that day.

i like to think it was because she was going to be seeing me.

lisa!

also not amused with the picture taking.

and we hadn't seen lisa in a while

(or had we? I dont know..)

so it was hugs all around...but that may be because we are girls.

but then our waiter wanted a hug from lisa too.

so she did.

she's nice like that

but she was not pleased about it.

look at her face.

you can see how she feels about it.

i think he was blissfully unaware of her feelings towards him.

look at his face.

so it was drinks all around.

there was also delicious cuban food all around.

i took my decision regarding cuban food very seriously, as you can see.

at least i think it was good cuban food.

i've never been to cuba, for obvious reasons.

and everyone agreed it was a good night indeed.

but that we all miss our friend.

and we wish she could have been there.

Neighbors and Excuses.

Yesterday I met my neighbor. Well, two of my neighbors. My closest neighbors, actually. Though they did not tell me their names. Probably because they cannot actually speak.

Things went well initially--they ignored me. Then the big one...lets call her Jane, started stomping and snorting.

I bid Jane and Patrick (her furry little buddy...also a completely

made-up name) farewell before things got ugly. Maybe I should bring treats with me next time. I guess that is SOP when meeting any neighbors... bring food.

So while I was working hard at spreading cheer and goodwill to our neighbors, Jane and Patrick, Husband was actually working hard. (That could be an ad, couldn't it...for an Acme brand truck, since I so cleverly cut off the hood ornamentation)

So Husband (who quickly tires of me taking pictures of him working) drives over to our hideous eyesore of a shed and gets the lawnmower out for the first time this season. And says

"Hey wife, want to learn how to drive the lawnmower?" To which I reply, "I most certainly do not, thank you." (because then I will not have an excuse for not cutting the grass)

And that's how i ended up driving the lawnmower yesterday. Those are my pretty red toenails. Not Husbands. And now i have no excuse.

Excuse me while I go lie down. I'll be on my front porch swing...thinking up excuses to not cut the grass.

Oh Dear, My First Post.

This is my first post. Obviously.

I guess I started this blog because of peer pressure. I caved. I

don't usually do that. But I did this time. Mostly to have another way to keep in touch with my dear friend and WW, Jennifer. (who is probably the only person reading this)

Now that that bit of housekeeping is out of the way...

Today Husband and I went on a nature hike/mushroom-hunting extravaganza. It was not so much an extravaganza as a walk through our woods.

We were looking for morel mushrooms. Morels are this small wild mushroom that only grow when conditions are exactly right. And since we got rain last night and it was 80 degrees today we decided to go mushroom hunting. By the way, mushroom hunting is the only hunting I can do because you can talk while you do it.

We were not successful on our mushroom hunting trip. But this was the first time I had walked this particular part of our property. And it's so beautiful. It is also a bit odd too. Lots of skinny little trees, vine-y sort of limbs, and a creek!

We took the dogs on the wilderness hike. That is always sort of a

gamble (I think) because Ruger doesn't like to listen.

But he does love to run in the woods and walk with his Papa. Look at that smile! (on Ruger, and no its not panting, he doesn't really pant)

There were no mushrooms over here either.

Ruger is trying to figure out how to cross the creek without getting wet or dirty. Bailey does not care about such things, not when there is water to run through and creeks to lay in.

I know it sort of looks like I give my dog drugs. But I don't. She's not high, I promise.

I didn't see any mushrooms because I mostly took pictures of my dogs and my husband, and trees. (It really is beautiful in the woods.)

And then we decided there probably weren't any mushrooms to be found today and we went home.